The Centers for Disease Control released new national abortion figures [the week of November 18] and the mainstream media has essentially ignored the fact that the number of women dying from legal abortions has doubled.

Americans United for Life President and CEO Dr. Charmaine Yoest called the news of a historic 5% drop in the abortion rate, released by the Centers for Disease Control on the eve of Thanksgiving, “a real cause for giving thanks.”

Nevertheless, the pro-life leader noted that reporting on the new data has not included a more somber data-point: the number of abortion-related maternal fatalities doubled in 2008, the most recent year data is available.

“The CDC report documents the death of twelve women following their abortion,” said Yoest. “That number is double the deaths reported the previous year and it’s the highest since 1994.”

Those legal abortion deaths continued this year as a young African-American woman, Tonya Reaves, died following a botched legal abortion she obtained at a Planned Parenthood facility in Chicago.

The autopsy report shows the 24-year old woman died from three major complications during a botched second-trimester abortion suffered at a Chicago area Planned Parenthood abortion clinic on July 20, 2012.

Yoest said the CDC officials compiling the annual abortion report note in their analysis that state laws have contributed to the decline in the number and rate of abortion. As the legal arm of the pro-life movement, Americans United for Life has paved the way for this historic drop in abortion through leading the development of the intellectual architecture of commonsense legislation designed to protect women and children, such as clinic regulations holding abortion providers to acceptable standards of care.

In 2009, close to 60 pro-life laws were enacted across the states, a marked increase from 2008 and that trend has continued as the passage of pro-life legislation at the state level has been steadily increasing.

The Berean Call is available by postal mail each month for free. We are willing to send the newsletter to you by regular mail but encourage you to read it online to save printing and mailing costs. Send us a message to add or change your paper mail address.

The Berean Call is also available in a large-print edition at a nominal cost.

If you are outside the U.S. The Berean Call is available by paid subscription .